1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a method and apparatus for providing a user interface, and more specifically to provide a user interface for a driven creation of linkages between master data records in a master data authoring user interface connected to a master data management system.
2. Description of the Related Art
Examples of links or linkages include relationships between customers (e.g., Person A is spouse of Person B, Person B is a child of Person C, Person A is an employee of Company X, Department G is department of Company X, Company X is managed by Person A, etc.), between products (e.g., is a part of, etc.), and between accounts/contracts and customers (e.g., Person D is a contract owner, Person E is a beneficiary, Person F is a premium payer, Person G is the subject of a contract, etc.). Conventional linkage solutions require multiple steps to create a single relationship. For example, the following process describes a customer master data domain:
Step 1. Navigate to the first customer of the relationship;
Step 2. Do action to add relationship;
Step 3. Select type of relationship;
Step 4. Do “action, i.e., search for second customer;”
Step 5. Enter customer search criteria;
Step 6. Do “perform search;”
Step 7. Select second customer record; and
Step 8. Add the new relationship.
This is, in the conventional process, for a given customer, at least 7 steps are required after the navigation step (Step 1) is completed to create a single relationship linkage. As a result, the conventional process has many steps that have to be repeated for each relationship, thereby making the conventional linking of people time consuming and error prone because the results depend also on search criteria that is manually entered.